Mediæval Military Architecture in England, Volume 2 (of 2)

by George Thomas Clark

The main entrance is placed in the east wall at about 40 yards from its south-east angle. The west gate stands in the west wall, about 30 yards from the north-west angle, which length is thrown back at a very obtuse angle, probably to avoid the remains of the Roman west gate, which stood about four yards in front of it. Both east and west gates are of Norman date, and were originally much alike, each being a plain arch, placed in a rectangular bay or recess in the wall, 18 feet wide by 10 feet deep, instead of, as was more usual, in a regular square gatehouse, as at Tickhill, Porchester, and Sherborne. The bay may have been closed in the rear by a cross-wall with a second archway, of which there is an indication at the west gate. There was an upper chamber with a timber floor. At the east gate the arch is full centred, of 14 feet opening, without chamfer or rebate, or ornament of any kind. Probably there is a portcullis groove, but if so it is blocked up and completely concealed by the woodwork of the modern doors. It is certain that the main entrance of a Norman castle could never have been so constructed that there should be no rebate against which the door should be pressed when closed, and probably the fitting was composed of a ring of stones inserted, as in the doorway in the cross-wall of Rochester keep, without bond, into the exterior arch. Over the door is a pointed window, probably an early English or early Decorated insertion. Later in the Decorated period, this gateway has been masked by a front containing a bold equilateral arch, springing from two angular corbels, behind which the Norman doorway is seen. Above, the two outer angles are capped by two round turrets, corbelled out of the angle and rising about 6 feet, and between them the curtain projects at a low angle, the salient being over the entrance. The arrangement is unusual, but the effect is good. It is said that the turrets contained staircases, ascending from the upper floor to the battlements, but they are not now accessible. There were lateral walls projecting forward from each side of the entrance. Across the ditch, and between them, was the drawbridge, traces of the recesses for working which still remain. The entrance was flanked by two stone lions, of one of which a fragment is preserved in the castle; the interior additions to this gate are entirely modern.

The west gate, of the same age and pattern, has fortunately been long walled up, and so has escaped alteration. Here the portcullis groove is exposed to view, and there is a rebate for the door, though concealed by the cross-wall. Here also is what looks like the springing of an arch across the inner face of the bay, though Norman mural towers were sometimes, as at Ludlow, left open, to be closed only with brattice-work. The upper floor has two small Norman windows in front, and a small door, flat headed, but with a round-headed arch of relief; this opened upon the battlements of the barbican. Of this barbican, which was composed of two flanking walls and an outer gate, the north wall remains and part of the south. The wall rises to the level of the upper floor of the gatehouse, projects about 30 feet, and is 7 feet thick. The masonry is evidently of the date of the gateway, and contains some herring-bone work. The approach must have been very steep, the sill of the gate being some feet above the level of the counterscarp.

Another work of Norman date is a rectangular tower, about 25 feet by 40 feet, placed upon the summit of the south-eastern mound; it is of two floors, vaulted, and chiefly built in ashlar; it contains a good straight mural staircase. To the Norman work has been added, in the Decorated period, a front, upon the east face, also of two floors, flanked by two square turrets, bringing up the whole tower to a square of 40 feet. The peculiarity of this tower is that, instead of flanking the curtain, it is set back a little from its line. A modern gazebo has been added above, and the whole is dignified by the name of the Observatory.

In the curtain, at the foot of the observatory mount, and between it and the keep, is a pointed arch of relief, and below it, beneath a rude flat lintel, composed of two large stones, is a small door, either never opened, or closed at a very early period. This arch is certainly late Norman, and seems of the same date with that part of the curtain in which it is imbedded.

The Keep, also Norman, is an unusually perfect example of a shell keep. It is in plan a somewhat irregular polygon, 64 feet north and south by 74 feet east and west within the walls, which are about 8 feet thick. Within, it has twelve sides, of irregular lengths. Without are fifteen, and each angle is capped with a broad flat pilaster, all rising from a common plinth. At about two-thirds of the height there is a set-off, common to wall and pilaster; the latter has also a bold roll moulding. The wall is 20 feet high to the rampart walk. The parapet is gone. The keep stands upon the line of the curtain, which abuts upon it at opposite sides; so dividing it that there are eight facets outside the wall, and seven inside. The main entrance is by a full-centred arch of 7 feet opening, set in a broad, projecting buttress or pilaster towards the north-east. The arch of the actual doorway and of its inner recess is segmental. There was no portcullis, and the door had a stout wooden bar. Above the outer arch is a hood-moulding, with a light Norman ornament, said to be a restoration from the original. At present a straight steep flight of steps leads up to the door, and these, though modern, probably represent the original mode of approach. There is another and smaller door, diagonally opposite to the main door, to the south-west; this is quite plain, the arches segmental, the outer boldly splayed. The opening is 5 feet 6 inches wide. There are traces of something like a third door in the eastern face outside the curtain, opening from a bay in the wall. Opposite to this, in the west wall, is another bay, also 12 feet wide, but no trace of an opening. There are no loops in the wall of the keep, no trace of any buildings within its area, nor have any foundations been discovered there. It is pretty clear that any accommodation provided there was by means of timber structures placed against the wall, leaving an open court in the centre. There are indications, on the masonry, of an upper floor. Where the two curtains join the keep, each contains, at its rampart level, a mural chamber, about 6 feet wide by 12 feet long, the floor of which is about 10 feet or 12 feet from the ground. These chambers are choked with brambles and not accessible, but they have no door towards the ramparts of the curtain, and seem to have been entered from the upper part of the keep; that to the west is a garderobe, and has a loop and shoot upon the north or inner face; the other has a loop only, and that outwards: one of them is said to have been groined and vaulted, the vaults springing from columns in the angles. This is probably that towards the east, and it may have been an oratory, as at Arundel.

The above works, curtain, gateways, observatory tower, and keep contain the only Norman masonry now extant. The curtain, for its great length, is singularly deficient in flanking towers. At the south-west angle the wall has been laid open by a wide breach, and built up, and there may have been a tower, but it is more probable that here was the junction with the city wall.

Generally, the lower two-thirds of the curtain look much older than the upper part, and the line of junction is very uneven, as though the wall had long been left in a ruinous condition. This may have been so; but, as there is no diminution in the excessive thickness, it seems more probable that the new work is confined to the facing. No doubt when the castle was taken by the county much was done to the walls; but they could scarcely, at that time, have been much lower than they are now, for to rebuild them at their present thickness would have been a great and quite unnecessary expense.

The herring-bone work is of a superficial character, confined to the facing; not, as in the Roman work, carried through the substance of the wall. Mr. Wilson, in his paper on this castle, states that, when the foundations of the curtain were laid open during some repairs, they were found to be worked in with a sort of framework of timber, tieing the whole together. Such a precaution was often taken by the Norman builders, even to the extent of enclosing ties in the superstructure, especially where the work was laid upon made ground. The cavities left by the decay of such ties are seen at Rochester and elsewhere.

There is a flanking tower capping the north-east angle of the place, an insertion, though whether replacing a Norman structure is not known. It is called “Cobbe Hall,” and is in plan very slightly horseshoe, with prolonged sides and a square rear. It is in breadth 25 feet, and in length 40 feet. It has a basement and first floor, both covered in with acutely-pointed vaulting, with deeply-splayed loops towards the field. The basement is reached by a trap-door and ladder, and the upper floor and battlements by a stone stair. It seems, from the rings let into the wall, to have been a prison. It has been called a chapel, probably because its round or apsidal end looks towards the north-east.

There is a deep well in the north side of the great enclosure, still in use, and the bottom of which has recently been enlarged into a cistern. The castle stands upon the oolite rock, and is mainly built of that material, laid as roughly-coursed rubble, but the keep, the observatory tower, and the Decorated work are mostly of ashlar.